PORTUGAL: Filed a petition to the parliament to erase the legal entity of the Jehovah's Witness

An Awake! article about 1960 castigated excommunication as wholly unscriptural and unscrupulous - as it was used historically by the clergy to give themselves the power of kings, not shepherds.

With speedy hypocrisy the Dubs adopted the same ecclesiastic process themselves after the elder arrangement was instituted - giving them the requisite ecclesiastic quorum of yes men to inflict whatever abuses they fancied.( the rack and stoning had been lost to them by legislation thankfully)

Since then, those shopping for a new religion have had instilled the notion that the ¨cleanliness of the congregations¨ was the objective of such overarching power.

Now, just like the churches of old, the WT hierarchy sanctions, prescribes and even records the rampant use of excommunication to enforce any issue whatsoever (tight pants, teenage immaturity, dissent, religious opinion, etc. etc. but not child molesters).

What fails to get instilled in the new fundamentalist is awareness of the psychological damage that results not just to the ostracized but also to the person coerced by their peers into practising a new and vicious act of conformity.

When a person decides to abandon a religion -even one which practises DFing and institutionalized, systemic shunning - and whether they understood or even practised such an act themselves while a member - it does not disqualify those people from freeing themselves from such a religion, with full protection of freedom of religion legislation.

The fruits of shunning are all bad - ask any psychologist to elaborate on the guilt, shame and damage to social beings.

Eden One - Good on you mate!

What impact will the suspension of the legal status of the WT society have on its members? - Derearyweather

In principle, none. The constitution ensures individuals the right to worship, gather and share their beliefs freely, so in principle this has no impact whatsoever on the rank and file lives.

Depending on the legal situation of each Kingdom Hall (who owns it), if the deed is made to the "Associação das Testemunhas de Jeová", then it might be subject to property tax. Same thing with the bethel building in Alcabideche. And the donations received might also be considered profit and therefore taxable.

IF .... IF things would go the best possible way, the meetings and literature might be monitored randomly by the authorities to ensure there is no hate speech against ex-members.

The question I have is how do you go about proving “coercion”? Whether one agrees with jws or not really is not the question, because jws do inform all potential members of their beliefs. In fact, it takes maybe a year or more to get baptized — that’s plenty of time to know what’s involved, to think about it, and to accept/reject their beliefs. I’d argue that the sheer amount of people who don’t get baptized though raises by JW parents dismantles that argument. Pew polls have showed that 66 percent of people raised as JW’s leave the faith as adults.

That’s a far to low retention rate to even remotely suggest coercion.

But the again, this petition really is nothing more than a way to drum up negative media publicity, as usual. There is no real attempt here enforce laws.

Lol Diog, 2016 convention video showed parents being instructed to shun their daughter and they did so for 15 years. Video uploaded to website as well, and freely accessible to anyone with an internet connection.

Even the public was invited and those who decided to come saw that video.

If you want to visit a family member or best friend who is DF and this is known by two JW's and it is an ongoing visit you get DF.

If you want to visit a DA person.....the same. Why?

The Society opened this DA door and they refused to close it because of Raymond Franz.

For those of you with reading disabilities go to the last high-lighted paragraph.

According to Franz, he began working in the organization's writing department and was assigned to collaboratively write Aid to Bible Understanding, the first religious encyclopedia published by Jehovah's Witnesses. On October 20, 1971 he was appointed as a member of the Governing Body.[9] In his personal memoir, Franz said that at the end of 1979 he reached a personal crossroad:I had spent nearly forty years as a full time representative, serving at every level of the organizational structure. The last fifteen years I had spent at the international headquarters, and the final nine of those as a member of the worldwide Governing Body of Jehovah's Witnesses. It was those final years that were the crucial period for me. Illusions there met up with reality. I have since come to appreciate the rightness of a quotation I recently read, one made by a statesman, now dead, who said: "The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie—deliberate, contrived and dishonest—but the myth—persistent, persuasive and unrealistic." I now began to realize how large a measure of what I had based my entire adult life course on was just that, a myth—persistent, persuasive and unrealistic.[10]

Frustrated by what he viewed as the Governing Body's dogmatism and overemphasis on traditional views rather than reliance on the Bible in reaching doctrinal decisions, Franz and his wife decided in late 1979 they would leave the international headquarters.[11]March 1980, Franz and his wife took a leave of absence from the world headquarters for health reasons and moved to Alabama, where he took up laboring work on a property owned by a fellow Witness. The following month, a committee of the Governing Body raised concerns about "wrong teachings" being spread by headquarters staff and began questioning staff about their beliefs. Staff were also questioned about comments Franz had made that may have contradicted Watch Tower doctrine.[12][13] The March 15, 1980 issue of The Watchtower issued a statement of regret that its assertions of probability of Armageddon arriving before 1975 had "apparently overshadowed the cautionary ones and contributed to a buildup of expectation already initiated."[14] It told disappointed Jehovah's Witnesses, "including persons having to do with the publication of the information that contributed to the buildup of hopes centred on that date" to "concentrate on adjusting his viewpoint".[15]

This statement, which placed blame for the disappointment about 1975 on Raymond Franz as the former chairman of the writing committee, precipitated a purge of that committee.[16] On May 8, 1980, Franz was told that he had been implicated as an apostate.

[17] He was called back to Brooklyn on May 20 for two days of questioning[18] by the Chairman's Committee. According to Franz, the discussion involved allegations that some Witnesses were meeting privately to discuss various teachings of the Watch Tower Society that may have constituted apostasy.

On May 21, 1980, Franz was called to a Governing Body session where he was questioned for three hours about his biblical viewpoints and commitment to Watch Tower doctrines.[2][19] Consequently, he agreed to a request to resign from the Governing Body and headquarters staff. Franz refused the Watch Tower Society's offer of a monthly stipend as a member of the "Infirm Special Pioneers".[20] The Governing Body investigation resulted in the disfellowshipping of several other headquarters staff.[21][22][23]

On September 1, 1980, the Governing Body distributed a letter to all Circuit and District overseers stating that apostates need not be promoting doctrines to be disfellowshipped. The letter stated that individuals who persisted in "believing other doctrine despite scriptural reproof" were also apostatizing and therefore warranted "appropriate judicial action".[18][24]

On March 18, 1981 Franz' employer in Alabama submitted a letter of disassociation from Jehovah's Witnesses. The September 15, 1981 issue of The Watchtower announced a change of policy on disassociation, directing that those who formally withdrew from the group were to be shunned by Witnesses in the same manner as those who have been disfellowshipped.[25]Franz, who continued to socialize with his employer, was summoned to a judicial hearing on November 25 and disfellowshipped for disobeying the edict.[2][26][27] Determined to present his point of view, not only with respect to his having been disfellowshipped, but with respect to broader doctrinal issues, in 1982 he sent Heather and Gary Botting proofs of his book Crisis of Conscience so that they could chronicle the more widespread discord within the Watch Tower Society.[28] They wrote regarding Franz' contribution to their exposé on the Witnesses that his recommendations "undoubtedly strengthened the veracity of the text; we were impressed by his insistence on both fairness and frankness with respect to representing the view of the Watch Tower Society."

And there you have it.......... a typical cheap shot by the Society to muzzle a different point of view that now impacts sincere ex JW's who just want to leave on the basis of principle not a sin of the flesh.

If you support the WTBTS right to make up rules that are not found in scripture....... your an idiot.

And if you think you know what your getting into if you accept baptism...your an idiot.

And if you think you know what your getting into if you accept baptism...your an idiot.

children/teenagers have that crutch to some degree (although growing up in the org they see enough to know EXACTLY what df’ing means), adults don't. If it makes you feel better now to say you didnt know then enjoy.... but we all knew. We just didnt see it for what the evil it was.

It is interesting. This petition intends to solve what is called a constitutional violation of a constitutional violation. What you are asking the government to do is coerce Jehovah's Witnesses to change their religious beliefs in order for them to be treated like other religions that receive tax-exempt status.

I am not familiar with the constitution of Portugal but most other countries the civil rights that a country's constitution enshrines protects those rights for citizens from being violated not by other private citizens but by the government. Most countries another citizen or another private organization can violate someone else's civil rights without any negative impact. In fact even in the US during the civil rights movement, activists couldn't sue a business over a civil rights violation just on the constitution alone, it required the Civil Rights Act for it to finally require private businesses, organizations and individuals that enforce civil rights.